In the manual or automatic application of paints to objects, a part-stream of the paint, which generally contains both solids and/or binders as well as solvents, is not applied to the object. This part-stream is called “overspray” among experts. In the following, the terms overspray and paint overspray or overspray particles are always understood in the meaning of a disperse system, such as an emulsion or suspension or a combination thereof, which is generally capable of flowing. The overspray is caught by the stream of fluid in the painting booth and fed to a separating operation. The fluid used is air, which, where necessary after suitable conditioning, can be passed back into the coating booth again.
In known painting systems of the type mentioned at the beginning, the overspray and, where appropriate, the solvent contained in the paint are simply recovered by both being left in the first instance in the spray booth and collected in collecting channels. The recovered overspray can then be removed from the collecting channels. A disadvantage is that the paint in the booth is widely scattered and the recovery losses are very high. Solvents are not recovered at all.
An object of the present invention is to configure a system of the type mentioned at the beginning in such a manner that the overspray can be recovered by simple means from the fluid flowing through the spray booth.